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Empty shelves, uncertainty at rural groceries anger Bella's customers

Dale Glitzke of Wellington likes the people who work at Bella's Market, whose shrinking stock has many citizens up in arms. (Cyrus McCrimmon, The Denver Post)

WELLINGTON —The Bella's Markets here and in several other rural towns were bustling centers of community life and the only grocery stores before Samuel Mancini took ownership in 2006.

Today, shelves are empty, employees fear for their jobs, locals have to drive dozens of miles to buy fresh meat and produce — and residents are fighting mad.

No one is accusing Mancini of criminal activity, but people say he ran his Bella's Markets into the ground. Now they hope someone else can step in and turn the businesses around.

"It just makes me livid that they can't get supplies. Slowly, it's dying," said Mary Ann Menoher, who lives near a Bella's Market in Wellington.

In Walden, "the shelves are pretty bare, the coolers are nonfunctioning," said Jane Berry, town administrator. "There's canned goods and paper goods, but people are going to Laramie and Steamboat Springs (for groceries)."

Those destinations present at least a 60-mile drive, she added.

Residents of other towns where the stores are located point to similar problems.

"It is a good thing he hasn't shown his face in this community, because this is still the wild West up here, and people tend to take things into their own hands," Berry said.

Mancini, 48, didn't return calls for comment.

Mancini went into the grocery business in Colorado in 2006 when he purchased a string of markets in Akron, Haxtun, Walden and Wiggins, and St. Francis, Kan., from Leroy Odell.

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Mancini and his investors went on to cut deals with other grocery companies, buying stores in Wellington, Gypsum, Limon and Stratton.

He seemed a reasonable businessman, a man with a quick grin and firm handshake, and residents expected things to go smoothly, said Walter Lamia, chairman of the Wellington Chamber of Commerce.

Mancini is a clinical faculty member at the University of Colorado School of Medicine, where he teaches leadership on a volunteer basis, said medical school spokesman Mark Couch.

"It's a real effort to get to Fort Collins to shop. Now it's once a month, but we will have to go more often," said Wanda Schmidt, right, with husband, Rich. (Cyrus McCrimmon, The Denver Post)

Not only that, "Sam did let me know he was a West Point grad when we first met," Wellington Mayor Jack Brinkhoff said in an e-mail.

A West Point spokesman said Mancini attended — but did not graduate — from the military academy.

His deal with Odell called for him to purchase inventory at the stores and lease the buildings.

Mancini didn't have the money to purchase the business outright, so Odell provided a $2 million loan to finance the deal, according to a document filed in Washington County District Court, during an attempt by Odell to evict Mancini from one of the stores in Akron.

The deal with Mancini's company, VM Odell's, quickly disintegrated. "During the first year, VM Odell's defaulted under its payment obligations," the document said.

The loan was modified twice, but Mancini, 48, continued to miss payments.

In September 2012, VM Odell's, a subsidiary of Mancini's Village Markets Holdings LTD, declared bankruptcy. The parent company, which owns other properties, didn't file for bankruptcy protection.

Public records show that even before he entered the deal with Odell, creditors were banging on Mancini's door. In May 2006, four months before the deal was finalized, a federal tax lien of $111,939 was filed against him in Denver.

In Colorado and Kansas, Mancini spent sales taxes his stores collected from customers, Odell's lawyers alleged in a bankruptcy filing.

Even as Mancini was missing payments to the Odells, he was milking the business to pay creditors and finance "his excessive lifestyle," according to allegations in the bankruptcy filing.

Between 2010 and June 2013, he paid himself $1.4 million and used about $700,000 of that to pay off judgments and claims against him, the bankruptcy document said.

Ronald Allen, the company's chief financial officer, said there "could have been" hundreds of checks made out for grocery deliveries that bounced in 2012, prior to the bankruptcy, according to a deposition taken Nov. 30, 2012, during bankruptcy proceedings.

VM Odell's has emerged from bankruptcy with a reorganization plan.

Odell, 80, who built his business after returning from the Korean War, is trying to reclaim the stores he once owned, said Annette Bowin,the town's clerk and administrator.

Odell wouldn't comment on the situation, but his lawyer, John O'Brian, said in an e-mail: "The Odell family suffered losses as a result of Bella's bankruptcy ... The Odell Family is very concerned about the current condition of the stores and the welfare of the communities."

An employee at one of the stores, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that although paychecks are not bouncing, workers fear for their jobs.

Confronting the empty shelves, shoppers ask when the store is closing "and people look at you like you are insane when you tell them you aren't closing," the employee said.

News that residents of the small towns face difficulty getting food is traveling since an Akron resident started a food drive.

This week, the town of Akron received two boxes of nonperishable food from someone in the Bronx, said Annette Bowin, the town's clerk and administrator.

She donated the Spam, Vienna sausages, and macaroni and cheese to a local food bank.

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